Fake alcohol flooding Siberia as New Year dawns

ULAN-UDE, December 27 (Itar-Tass) — Fake alcohol is flooding Russia’s Siberia ahead of New Year holidays.

Police say bootleg alcohol comes mainly from the country’s south. The Baikal territory tops the list of fake vodka on sale. Only in December alone the region’s transport police seized 110,000 liters of fake vodka and 16,000 liters of dangerous alcohol-containing liquid – 41 percent of the total bootleg alcohol seized for twelve months.

“Several large batches of such alcohol were seized in the region,” the press service of the Interior Ministry’s Baikal territory transport police told Itar-Tass on Tuesday. “Most batches of bootleg alcohol came to the Baikal territory from the North Caucasus regions. The investigation is underway.”

In a separate incident, police seized four 20-tonne containers of fake vodka with forged excise stamps at a railway station in Mogocha and another five similar containers at a railway station of Krasnokamensk. Moreover, two batches of bootleg alcohol and 16 tonnes of alcohol-containing liquid were confiscated at a railway station in Chita.

In 2011 the country’s police seized a total of 305,000 liters of bootleg alcohol.